It's a fool who plays it cool by making his world a little colder.mostly silly, with a 20% chance of science

Monday, March 1, 2010

Note to self: leave better notes to self

I'm currently (intermittently, half-heartedly) tidying my inbox and desk after the latest round of grant applications. In the process, I uncovered a note in my own handwriting on the pad of post-its that I use for jotting down phone messages:

Louise Golbey

Same old same old

Hmmm, I thought.

Who the hell is Louise Golbey? And why did I react that way to her phone message? "Same old same old" implies that we were having a conversation that I found boringly familiar... but I just can't place that name. Did the grant-inspired adrenaline rush and/or the two-week Olympic party seriously addle my brains that much?!

I searched my email folders for her name - nothing.

I searched a couple of institutional contact lists - nothing.

But Google had the answer: she's a musician who was recently profiled on the "BBC Introducing" podcast, to which I subscribe.

I keep a list of artists I've heard on podcasts who I want to investigate further, but it's usually as a note in my iPhone.Using the telephone message post-its instead probably saved me a couple of minutes on a busy day, but cost me much more than that in solving the mystery (and then blogging about it - d'oh!) today.

Anyway, you should check her out. I don't write that many names down in a given month, so her music obviously stands out, even if her name didn't!

12 comments:

Makes me think of those strange things you write down when you wake up in the middle of the night with a Most Excellent Idea(TM). You know, the notes that are absolute gibberish when read again in the light of day.

Pretty funny, and here I was thinking that your poor friend would be so embarrassed to read this post about her boring life. :)

I've left "Note to self" messages on twitter, wherein a bot repeats the message back to the @ inbox - but still, one has to check it! (Best for night messages right before bed when on mobile - but a notepad next to the bed works just as well.)

Ricardipus, I did once wake up to find a note I'd written in the night saying "love is not a double blind placebo controlled experiment", but that was the only time. And it was after a Glasgow pub crawl.

Thomas, well surely she'd be pleased to read that I heard her on a free podcast and now want to check out more of her music :)

EGF, you're very welcome! It really was an awesome idea.

Silver Fox, so you just type note to self and it pings back? That's an interesting trick to know!

I still find epp tubes in the freezer labelled "PCR 1" or something similar. So, yeah, I can tell it's not a tube of frozen water, but what the hell is PCR1? Was it so awesome that I was sure not to forget and felt compelled not to label it properly. This brings me to two important questions: (1) Can any PCR really be that awesome? and (2) Why, after so many years in the lab, do I still convince myself that I will remember what this actually means despite the fact that I never do?

I have had moments like that a lot lately. I'm trying to finish my thesis and looking through some of the notes I made the last time I finally broke down and read the whole thing through, instead of in sections... I have no idea what two of the comments mean, STILL.

I promise to respond to all respectful non-spam comments! Don't be shy! Oh, and please don't type my surname in your comments; I know you all know what it is, but I'd prefer Google to rank other pages before this blog.